The present invention relates to child safety seat for a motor vehicle and a child""s sleep collar or child""s headrest for use with a child safety seat. More particularly, the present invention relates to an apparatus for supporting the head of a forward facing sleeping child while riding in a car safety seat.
Conventional child safety seats are designed to secure children in vehicles and to restrain them in the event of an impact. Beginning at around 1 year of age, children sit upright in forward facing car seats, often for long periods of time. Toddlers and older children in the range of 30-80 pounds typically sit upright in high back booster seats. In any child safety seat, the potential for a child to doze or fall asleep while sitting in the car seat is high. When this occurs in a forward facing car seat or booster seat, the child""s head typically sags, droops, or hangs unsupported in a forward or lateral position from the neck. This hanging position is uncomfortable for the child and may result in excessive strain on the neck muscles or other injuries.
In order to address the lack of neck and head support of conventional child safety seats, various designs have been proposed. Many of these designs are adapted to attach to a conventional child safety seat and to provide lateral head support, but they typically provide only minimal frontal head support. Such headrests typically leave an opening at the front, which minimizes strangulation hazards, but which also minimizes frontal head support. For example, Baskin-Lockman et al., U.S. Pat. No. 6,139,100, discloses a headrest that is detachably connectable to the backrest portion of a child safety seat. Although the Baskin-Lockman headrest provides lateral support to a child""s head, it merely attempts to deter forward motion of a child""s head through the use of a pillow shaped lower portion on its lateral supports. The Baskin-Lockman headrest does not positively support the chin or otherwise provide positive support to a child""s head as it droops forward.
To avoid any strangulation concerns and yet positively support a child""s chin, other known child headrest designs have been proposed that surround the child""s neck, but are wholly unattached to the child safety seat. Headrests such as these provide frontal and lateral support, but because they are unattached to a seat, they are easy for a person to misplace or to forget to install. For example, Rogers, U.S. Pat. No. D353,966, discloses a triangular headrest that surrounds a child""s neck, but does not attach to a seat. The Roger""s headrest uses a hook and loop fastener to connect the forward legs of its headrest to each other in order to surround a child""s neck. The hook and loop fastener of the Roger""s headrest uses the hook and loop fastener in the shear direction to positively attach the headrest legs to each other. As such, the Roger""s headrest is not designed to release in front of a child""s chin with forward motion of the child relative to the headrest. Rather, the Roger""s headrest is designed to remain firmly attached around the child""s neck, but not attached to the child safety seat.
As understood from the foregoing discussion, there is a need for a device attached to a child safety seat, which provides lateral and frontal support to the head of a sleeping child restrained in the child safety seat, and which does not present a strangulation hazard to the child in the event of an accident.
The present invention has been developed to overcome the foregoing limitations and disadvantages of conventional headrests for child safety seats, and to generally fulfill the need in the art for a child""s sleep aid that provides forward and lateral support to a child""s head, attaches to a child safety seat, but that does not restrain a child""s neck in the event of an accident.
According to the invention, there is provided a child""s sleep collar for use with a child safety seat that includes a pair of collar supports, forming a left and a right collar support. Each of the collar supports has a first and a second end. The first end is designed to attach respectively to a left or right belt positioning clip of a child safety seat. The second end of each collar support forms a generally planar surface and has a left or right collar fastener respectively attached to the planar surface.
Each of the collar fasteners are designed to releasably engage the other collar fastener. When the collar fasteners are attached, thereby coupling the left collar support to the right collar support, the left planar surface faces the right planar surface. Although almost any fastener that releasably engages an opposing fastener may be appropriate, it is preferable to use fasteners that, when coupled, provide a greater retention force between the fasteners in the shear direction than in the tensile direction.
Each of the collar supports preferably further includes a body having an attachment end and a coupling end. Each coupling end includes the respective collar support second end, planar surface, and collar fastener. An attachment strap is preferably connected to each attachment end for attaching to a respective belt positioning clip of a child safety seat. Further, each attachment strap preferably forms a loop that connects around a belt positioning clip and retains the loop using a hook and loop fastener.
The body includes a cushion fill material and is preferably tubular. In one aspect of the invention, each body is substantially arcuate and is adapted to translate a force applied ly against the arcuate body, when the bodies are coupled to each other and are attached to a child safety seat, into a tensile force between the fasteners. In another aspect of the invention, each body is substantially straight and is adapted to translate a force applied perpendicularly against the straight body into a tensile force between the fasteners. This occurs when the force is applied in a direction substantially perpendicular to the straight body and away from the opposing body when the bodies are coupled to each other and are attached to a child safety seat.
According to another aspect of the invention, either the left or the right collar support is substantially U-shaped, and the other collar support is substantially straight. Additionally, according to a different aspect of the invention, either the left or the right collar support is substantially V-shaped, and the other collar support is substantially straight.
According to yet another aspect of the invention, there is provided a child safety seat for a motor vehicle that includes a seat base, a seat back attached to the seat base, a pair of belt positioning clips for receiving a motor vehicle shoulder belt, and child""s sleep collar as recited above.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a child""s sleep collar for use with a child safety seat that provides lateral and frontal support to a child retained within a child safety seat.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a child""s sleep collar for use with a child safety seat, which attaches to the child safety seat, and which closes in front of the neck of a child retained within a child safety seat, but releases across a child""s neck in the event of an impact or car accident.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a child""s sleep collar for use with a child safety seat that adjustably and releasably attaches to the child safety seat.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a child""s sleep collar for use with a child safety seat that attaches to the belt positioning clips of a child safety seat.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a child safety seat that includes a child""s sleep collar that provides lateral and frontal support to a child retained in the seat.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a child safety seat that includes a child""s sleep collar that closes in front of the neck of a child retained within the seat, and that releases across a child""s neck in the event of an impact or car accident.
Further areas of applicability of the present invention will become apparent from the detailed description provided hereinafter. It should be understood that the detailed description and specific examples, while indicating the preferred embodiment of the invention, are intended for purposes of illustration only and are not intended to limit the scope of the invention.